You’ll note Santa’s helmet at the left. This banner was from 1944, 80 years ago, six months after D-Day and right in the heart of the Battle of the Bulge, which explains the light in the window at the right. The war was also in the heart of most comic strips on Christmas that year. […]
Trigger Warning: The following post includes disturbing images and concepts. Those who find such thoughts upsetting may wish to move to a planet were bad things don’t happen. Jeff Stahler (AMS) summarizes the latest tragedy, in which three vehicles of World Central Kitchen, which had been providing food to starving civilians in Gaza, were attacked […]
“Whoever fights with monsters should see to it that he does not become a monster in the process. And when you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazes into you.” — Friedrich Nietzche Both Nietzche and Joe Heller offer symbolic analogies; Heller’s is harder to misinterpret, but neither makes it easy to answer […]
The resumption of war in Gaza is no rumor, though Glen LeLievre manages at least to inject a note of dark comedy, noting the futility of the recent ceasefire. There are all sorts of ways this could have been a maudlin reflection, but the Warner Brothers cartoon mood, IMHO, is more eye-catching and effective. By […]
Martyn Turner gets a gold star today, not for the intent of his cartoon, since I know nothing about David Cameron, who has replaced Suella Braverman, but for having correctly cited the old sailors’ myth of rats prophetically leaving a sinking ship. Cartoonists continually draw ships at sea, listing as they begin to sink beneath […]
Well, of course it is, David Rowe, but thank you for pointing it out, since we don’t seem to remember, or perhaps care. The idea that “Truth is the first casualty in war” is such a common observation that it makes a fascinating entry for the Quote Investigator, but, appropriately, is a casualty of its […]
Grand Avenue (AMS) marks a cultural change that has often sent me digging through the memory banks. I suppose the sign might have been when the streetlights came on, and it’s possible, since they were more likely set to a specific time rather than light actuated, which would have sent us straight home from the […]
(Clay Jones) (Patrick Chappatte) I wasn’t sure what order to put this pair in, since they’re both ludicrous and neither of them made me laugh but they both got a grim chuckle, which isn’t the same thing. Jones mocks Putin more directly, but it’s hard to say which cartoonist exaggerates the reality more, with Chappatte […]
My blogging partner, DD Degg, forwarded an article from the Spectator on war and cartooning, in which the above WWII David Low cartoon is referenced though not shown. The article is a quick read and nicely done, but doesn’t show any of the cartoons it discusses. Which is why you should read it there and […]
We’ll start the day with a quick, unexpected history lesson, courtesy of Jeff Danziger (WPWG). I went to look up Vyacheslav Molotov to confirm that he was Stalin’s Minister of Defense during the Hungarian uprising, and discovered that he wasn’t: He was Foreign Minister. More important, I discovered that the Molotov cocktail, though used to […]
The best part of this Daddy’s Home (Creators) is that he’s right, sort of. That is, we shouldn’t believe what they say, because we all use more than 10 percent of our brain, though the people who keep saying this perhaps do not. It’s appropriate that she’s on her laptop, because that’s a flowing river […]
I particularly like Andy Davey’s piece, both for what it is and for how it contrasts with other commentary. We need to be a little cautious in accepting everything we hear from the resistance, because they’re in a war for hearts-and-minds, too, but it is plain that Ukraine hasn’t folded up like Putin expected it […]
A few quick shots before we descend into merriment: Jeffrey Koterba gets the Wordle Award for capitalizing on the fad without screwing things up. He’s right: Five letters. One word. Okay, “Putin” is a proper noun, but at least he didn’t show a bunch of colored boxes that don’t match the gag, which as become […]
In this Non Sequitur (AMS), Wiley Miller longs for the world before social media, and whether this would be a lame amusement park or the basis for culture war is open to debate. If it would be war, we could hope enough people would sit around whining about how lame it was that the shock […]
Pat Bagley borrows a well-known line from “1984” to point out the unspeakable lies being put forth by the Republicans, and, while he specifies his home-state Utah’s branch, it was the text from the Republican National Committee that classified trespassing, assaulting police officers, theft, vandalism and crapping on the floor as “legitimate political discourse.” It’s […]